Addiction Treatment for Veterans: Resources and Addiction Rehab
At Crestone Wellness, we’re committed to supporting military veterans on their journey to addiction recovery. We proudly accept Humana Tricare insurance, making our high-quality substance abuse treatment services accessible to many military members and veterans.
Understanding Substance Use Disorders in Veterans
Military veterans face unique challenges that can contribute to the development of substance abuse disorder. Around 11% of veterans who visit a medical facility run by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) struggle with a substance use disorder. The complex interplay of military culture, traumatic experiences, and the challenges of reintegration create a distinct risk profile for our nation’s heroes.
Risk Factors Specific to Military Service
- Military Culture: The military often has a culture where drinking is normalized as a way to bond, cope with stress, or celebrate. This normalization can lead to patterns of alcohol abuse that continue after service.
- Transition to civilian life: Adjusting to civilian routines after military service can be disorienting and stressful. Military veterans often report feeling disconnected from civilian society, struggling to find purpose, and having difficulty translating their military skills into civilian employment. These stressors can trigger drug use as a coping mechanism.
- Combat exposure: The psychological impact of combat experiences can lead to self-medication with substances. Veterans may use substances to numb intrusive memories, reduce hypervigilance, or help them sleep when nightmares are frequent.
- Physical injuries: Managing chronic pain from service-related injuries sometimes leads to dependence on prescription medications. Veterans are more likely than civilians to experience chronic pain, with estimates suggesting that up to 60% of veterans who served in the Middle East suffer from chronic pain conditions.
- Loss and grief: Processing the loss of fellow service members creates profound grief that can be difficult to address. The culture of strength in the military may make it harder for veterans to openly process these emotions, leading some to self-medicate instead.
- Military Sexual Trauma (MST): Both male and female service members who have experienced sexual trauma during their service are at significantly higher risk for developing substance use disorders. MST often goes unreported and untreated, compounding the risk.
Impact on Veterans’ Lives
Substance abuse disorder among military veterans can have far-reaching consequences:
- Employment difficulties: Maintaining steady employment can become challenging, especially when drug addiction interferes with reliability and performance.
- Relationship strain: Families and loved ones often bear the brunt of a veteran’s alcohol addiction, creating tension and breakdown in critical support systems.
- Housing instability: Drug abuse and alcohol abuse contribute significantly to the disproportionate rates of homelessness among veterans.
- Legal problems: Veterans with substance use issues may face legal consequences, including DUIs, possession charges, or behavioral offenses while under the influence.
- Suicidality: Perhaps most concerning, veterans with substance abuse disorder have a significantly higher risk of suicide attempts and completion.
Common Substances Used by Veterans
Military veterans may develop dependencies on various substances, each with unique patterns of use, effects, and challenges for recovery:
- Alcohol: The most commonly misused substance among veterans, with rates of alcohol addiction significantly higher than in civilian populations. Many military members report using alcohol to:
- Help with sleep disturbances and nightmares
- Reduce anxiety in social situations
- Numb emotional responses to triggers
- Cope with intrusive memories of combat or service experiences
Heavy alcohol abuse often begins during service as part of the military culture but can escalate after discharge, particularly for combat veterans. The withdrawal process from alcohol can be medically serious and potentially life-threatening, requiring professional supervision at an alcohol rehab center.
- Prescription drugs: Particularly opioid painkillers prescribed for service-related injuries. Military veterans are twice as likely as non-veterans to die from accidental overdoses of prescription painkillers. Common prescription medications misused by veterans include:
- Opioid pain medications (OxyContin, Vicodin, Percocet)
- Benzodiazepines for anxiety or sleep (Xanax, Valium, Klonopin)
- Stimulants prescribed for ADHD or combat-related attention issues (Adderall, Ritalin)
Many veterans begin using these medications legitimately but develop drug addiction as they attempt to manage chronic pain, anxiety, or sleep disturbances. Prescription drug abuse often goes unrecognized longer than other substance issues because the medications were initially obtained legally.
- Illicit drugs: Including marijuana, cocaine, and heroin, sometimes used to self-medicate symptoms of mental health conditions. Veterans may turn to illicit substances when:
- Prescribed medications are no longer effective or available
- They’re seeking more powerful relief from symptoms
- They’ve developed tolerance to prescription medications
- They’re trying to avoid the healthcare system due to distrust or previous negative experiences
Heroin use has increased among veterans in recent years, often following prescription opioid use when prescriptions become unavailable or insufficient. Some veterans also report using marijuana or psychedelics in attempts to manage PTSD symptoms when traditional treatments have failed.
Polysubstance Use
Many veterans struggle with polysubstance use—the simultaneous use of multiple substances. This pattern creates complex withdrawal needs and increases overdose risk. For example, the combination of opioid painkillers with alcohol or benzodiazepines is particularly dangerous and potentially fatal.
Barriers to Treatment
Despite high rates of substance abuse disorder, military veterans face several barriers to seeking treatment:
- Stigma within military culture around behavioral health and addiction issues
- Concerns about how seeking help might affect military records or future employment
- Difficulty navigating the healthcare system, including VA services
- Geographical distance from specialized alcohol rehab or drug rehab facilities
- Challenges with insurance coverage for comprehensive addiction treatment program options
The Trauma-Addiction Connection in Veterans
For many military veterans, drug addiction and alcohol addiction develop as attempts to cope with service-related trauma. This bidirectional relationship between trauma and addiction creates a complex cycle that requires specialized treatment options. Understanding this connection is crucial for effective treatment planning and addiction recovery support.
The Self-Medication Hypothesis
Research strongly supports the self-medication hypothesis in military veterans—the theory that individuals use substances to relieve specific distressing symptoms:
- Veterans with hyperarousal symptoms (jumpiness, hypervigilance) often report using depressants like alcohol or benzodiazepines to “take the edge off”
- Those experiencing emotional numbness may use stimulants in an attempt to feel something
- Veterans with sleep disturbances frequently use substances to help initiate sleep, though this typically worsens sleep quality over time
- Intrusive memories and flashbacks related to post-traumatic stress disorder are often temporarily suppressed with alcohol or opioids
This self-medication provides short-term relief but ultimately worsens both the drug addiction and the underlying trauma symptoms, creating a progressively deteriorating cycle.
How Trauma Affects the Brain
Traumatic experiences, such as those encountered during combat, can significantly alter brain function. Modern neuroscience has documented specific changes in the brains of trauma survivors that help explain the connection to addiction:
- Stress response systems: Combat and military stress can lead to persistent dysregulation of the body’s stress response system. The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis becomes chronically activated, keeping veterans in heightened states of alertness and causing:
- Elevated cortisol levels that maintain a constant “fight-or-flight” state
- Difficulty distinguishing between real and perceived threats
- Physical symptoms including muscle tension, digestive issues, and cardiovascular strain
- Disruption of normal sleep cycles and rest states
- Reward pathways: The brain’s reward system, centered around dopamine circuits, is altered by both trauma and substance use:
- Trauma can dampen normal pleasure responses, creating anhedonia (inability to feel pleasure)
- Substances provide temporary dopamine surges that feel especially powerful against this dampened baseline
- Over time, these circuits become increasingly sensitive to stress triggers and cravings
- The brain begins to associate substance use with safety or relief, strengthening addiction pathways
- Emotional regulation: The prefrontal cortex, responsible for rational decision-making and impulse control, can be functionally impaired by trauma:
- Making it harder to manage difficult emotions without external support
- Reducing the effectiveness of cognitive control over emotional reactions
- Impairing the ability to tolerate distress without turning to substances
- Creating difficulty in recognizing and naming emotions (alexithymia)
- Memory systems: Trauma affects how memories are stored and retrieved:
- Traumatic memories often remain fragmented and unprocessed
- These memories can be triggered involuntarily by environmental cues
- Substance use temporarily interrupts the distressing memory retrieval
- This reinforces the pattern of using substances when triggered
Trauma Types Common Among Veterans
Military veterans may experience various forms of trauma, each potentially contributing to substance abuse disorder:
- Combat trauma: Witnessing death, experiencing life-threatening situations, making moral compromises under pressure
- Operational stress: Continuous hypervigilance, sleep deprivation, and high-stakes decision-making
- Military sexual trauma: Sexual assault or harassment during service
- Training accidents: Witnessing or experiencing serious injuries during preparation for deployment
- Moral injury: Being forced to act against one’s moral code or witnessing events that violate deeply held beliefs
- Grief and loss trauma: Losing comrades and processing survivor’s guilt
Each type of trauma may manifest differently and require specific substance abuse treatment programs. Many military members experience multiple trauma types, creating complex clinical presentations that often require both behavioral health intervention and addiction treatment.
The Dual Diagnosis Challenge
Many military veterans experience co-occurring disorders – the simultaneous presence of both a substance abuse disorder and a mental health condition such as PTSD, depression, or anxiety. At Crestone Wellness, our therapeutic approaches address these interconnected conditions through:
- Integrated treatment: Addressing both drug addiction and mental health simultaneously
- Trauma-informed care: All our clinical staff are trained in trauma-informed approaches specific to military members
- Evidence-based therapies: Including EMDR, CBT, and DBT are effective for veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder
At Crestone Wellness, we provide comprehensive care that addresses the specific needs many military veterans face:
Medical Detoxification
Our medical detox program provides 24/7 clinical supervision to ensure a safe, comfortable withdrawal process for military veterans. Our medical team has experience working with veterans and understanding their unique detoxification needs. We often utilize medication-assisted treatment to minimize withdrawal symptoms, particularly for those overcoming alcohol addiction or opioid dependence.
Residential Treatment
Our residential treatment program offers a structured environment where military veterans can focus entirely on recovery from drug addiction and alcohol addiction. Treatment includes:
- Individual therapy sessions with licensed therapists experienced in behavioral health needs of veterans
- Group therapy with peers experiencing similar challenges
- Evidence-based therapies specifically effective for trauma processing and post-traumatic stress disorder
After completing residential treatment, many veterans transition to outpatient treatment programs to continue their addiction recovery journey.
Therapies Particularly Beneficial for Veterans
- EMDR Therapy: Effective for processing traumatic memories associated with military service
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Helps veterans identify and change negative thought patterns
- Dialectical Behavior Therapy: Provides skills for emotional regulation and distress tolerance
- Internal Family Systems: Addresses different aspects of self that may have been affected by military service
Discharge Planning and Aftercare
We work closely with veterans to develop comprehensive discharge plans that connect them with:
- Veteran-specific support groups
- VA resources and benefits
- Community-based services
Financial Accessibility Through Humana Tricare
We understand that financial concerns can be a barrier to seeking treatment. Crestone Wellness is pleased to accept Humana Tricare insurance, which many military veterans rely on for healthcare coverage. Our admissions team can help you:
- Verify your insurance benefits
- Understand your coverage for alcohol rehab, drug rehab, and other substance abuse treatment programs
- Navigate any authorization requirements
- Explore additional financial options if needed
Whether you’re looking for rehab for yourself or helping a loved one find addiction treatment, our team can walk you through the process.
Resources for Veterans
VA Resources
- Veterans Crisis Line: 1-800-273-8255 (Press 1) – 24/7 support for veterans in crisis
- VA Substance Use Disorder Program Locator: www.va.gov/directory/guide/SUD.asp
- My HealtheVet: www.myhealth.va.gov – Online portal for VA health services
Community Support
- Alcoholics Anonymous (AA): www.aa.org – Find veteran-specific meetings
- Narcotics Anonymous (NA): www.na.org
- SMART Recovery: www.smartrecovery.org
Veterans-Specific Organizations
- Wounded Warrior Project: www.woundedwarriorproject.org
- Disabled American Veterans (DAV): www.dav.org
- Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA): www.iava.org
Local Austin Area Resources
- Central Texas VA Health Care System: (512) 823-4000
- Austin Veterans Center: (512) 416-1314
- Texas Veterans Commission: (512) 463-6564
Start Your Recovery Journey Today
Recovery is possible, and you don’t have to face it alone. At Crestone Wellness, we’re committed to providing compassionate, quality care that addresses the unique challenges military veterans face in overcoming addiction.
Whether you’re seeking substance abuse treatment for yourself or for a loved one who has served, our team is ready to help you take the first step toward lasting addiction recovery from alcohol addiction, drug addiction, or other substance use issues.
